Former NY mayor Michael Bloomberg pledges $53m to fight gun violence

Washington: Former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg has ramped up his efforts to fight gun violence with a plan to spend $US50 million ($53.4 million) on a grassroots network to organise voters on gun control.

The initiative's political target is the powerful pro-gun lobby, including the National Rifle Association, which spends millions of dollars each year to back gun-rights supporters.

Mr Bloomberg's group, called Everytown for Gun Safety, will focus on state and local lawmakers, corporate boards, and state and federal elections - "fields of play formerly occupied almost solely by the gun lobby", according to a statement.

The billionaire told NBC's Today show he did not view his $US50 million investment as a "heavy political lift", but rather it was the "31,000 Americans [that] either get murdered or commit suicide with illegal guns. That's the heavy lift."

The staunch gun control advocate already bankrolled a $US12 million advertising campaign last year that promoted background checks and targeted key members of the US Senate.

The new initiative will focus on expanding background checks for gun buyers at state and national levels rather than on sweeping federal weapons bans that have been stymied in Washington.

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Gun control is a fiercely divisive issue in the US, where the right to bear arms is enshrined in the US constitution alongside such basic rights as free speech and freedom of religion.

"I think the NRA should be very afraid," said Shannon Watts, a founder of gun control group Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. "The gun lobby has done a good job over the last 30 years of making a local minority afraid that people would take their guns away," she said.

Gun control advocates have long called for a better system of background checks. After 12 people were killed in September at the Washington Navy Yard, US President Barack Obama said the US needed a better way to check whether gun buyers have mental health problems.

The National Rifle Association, the largest US lobby group for gun rights, spent $US20 million in the 2012 election cycle, according to the Centre for Responsive Politics. The association, which claims nearly 5 million members, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mr Bloomberg told The New York Times that gun control advocates need to learn from the NRA and punish those politicians who fail to support their agenda."They say, 'We don't care. We're going to go after you,' " he said of the NRA. "We've got to make them afraid of us."

Mr Bloomberg has been particularly outspoken about tightening existing gun laws since a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at a primary school in Sandy Hook, Connecticut, in 2012.

The three-term New York City mayor also advocated for measures to curb obesity, smoking and even salt content in food. He told the Times he was proud of the work, which some critics said interfered with personal choice.

"I am telling you, if there is a God, when I get to heaven I'm not stopping to be interviewed. I am heading straight in. I have earned my place in heaven. It's not even close."

Mr Bloomberg will chair the new gun control network, which includes the 1.5 million members of existing groups Mayors Against Illegal Guns, which he co-founded, and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.

The group will look closely at 15 states, including pro-gun states such as Texas, and other states where gun control initiatives have advanced. The group aims to sign up 1 million new supporters this year, and would reward political candidates "who are protecting lives, and make sure that those who are trying to keep people from being protected lose elections", Mr Bloomberg said.